


Magic and Fire

by Not_Your_Deers



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-18 20:57:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20645558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Not_Your_Deers/pseuds/Not_Your_Deers
Summary: Time is a circle. It begins as it will end as it will begin again. Most every person lives their life in one lane, on one path. Never changing, never growing. But these six, they weren’t most people.





	Magic and Fire

Time is a circle. It begins as it will end as it will begin again. Most every person lives their life in one lane, on one path. Never changing, never growing. But these six, they weren’t most people. When the world told them to turn left, they went right. When it told them to laugh, they cried. When it told them to die, they lived. They were magic and fire and something wholly unexpected. 

The first was the last was the first. He smiled daggers and shook the world with his laugh. He crafted a new world with dreams and whispers. He ran shadowed games of _ somethings. _His wife bled water and cried blood. His children weren’t made of flesh, but snow and ash and shadow. One was like him, one was not, and one simply was. Time could not abide a man like him. 

She was the second of three and of six and of nine. She wafted between worlds like a ghost, like a thought. She was more magic than woman. She laughed and cried and died and the world moved on, but she remained. String tied to a spinning wheel, waiting, watching, turning. She had no name or face or home - anything to call her own. She was a thief of names, and lives, made of nothing but wind (and fire, and earth). And so Time stole from her.

Darkness has a mind. In some dark places, the shadows breathe and live and thrive. She came from one of those dark places, from one twisted heart in three broken bodies. The darkness - the woman - was vain, and proud. It laughed like ice and glared with burning fire. It wished, so desperately, to become something more, something less, anything but this. She prayed for change to long forgotten gods. And so Time made her one.

Twisting, laughing, smile hidden behind her hand. She is not like the others. No magic, no power, no daggers hidden under her trim silk sleeves. She is a sister, and a daughter, and a friend. When he cries at night, she’s at his side. When he can’t breathe, she brings him water. An ordinary girl, climbing step by step, tear after tear. For him. Time takes him from her, time after time. 

Blood. Lights. Dancing, screaming shadows. Back alleys and whispered words. The fifth is all show, no substance, no heart but the white steel he crafts. No choice for one like him, no place to go, nowhere to run. He makes a choice, builds a home, crafts friends and lovers. It’s never enough. The poison in his breath is too strong, his eyes too dark and cold. He drives all the love away. So Time brings his destruction closer. 

The last was the first was the last. Black hearted, his smile is his only weapon in this world he can’t control or comprehend. His lips whisper stories, pretty lies of a simpler time. Who is he, but the weakest son of a twisted king? He has no place, and no way to build one. Stranded in the middle of an ocean with no idea where to go, he gives in, hidden in the shadow of a greater man. Time forgets about him, and so the circle shifts.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope y'all enjoyed this little character study piece. I wanted to show how influential some of the more minor characters were on the story, and try to write more in Stiefvater's writing style. Comments are appreciated!
> 
> \- The Slytherin


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